Tag: Government

Recently, the president has said that we need to limit violence in our society including “the gruesome and grisly video games that are now commonplace”. These games are apparently a part of the problem that led to the attacks that killed and injured several people. But what is the role of government in all this? Is its role to regulate video games that a government official deems violent? Is this what needs to be discussed? Decide what’s important once you hear Johan Norberg break down the stats.

Sweden? A bunch of socialists. It’s like Cuba, without the sun. We hate it, or love it if we’re leftists. But both the Left and the Right abroad are Dead Wrong® about Sweden. Free To Choose® Media Executive Editor and Cato Institute Senior Fellow Johan Norberg sets the record straight on the Nordic “socialist paradise”.

What is the legitimate role of government in a free society? Most agree that there is one, albeit small. The Constitution lays out these roles, but they are ignored and trampled on year after year. Laws are passed, programs are implemented, and taxes are collected all in the name of progress. Yet most conflict directly with the liberties granted and restrictions imposed by the Constitution. The problem is not going away and seems to be getting worse. History is on our side. When governments have overstepped, the results have not been kind. Dr. Walter Williams puts these concerns in an …

It’s impossible to predict the behaviors and actions of any one individual. So how can economists ever hope to understand the effects a shift in policy will have on the consumers within the economy? While individuals behave irrationally, groups give us more insight into understanding behavior and the impact those decisions will have on economics. For economist Gary Becker, one of those fundamental groups is family, “One of the things that families do is to care for their children, to invest in their children, to teach their children morals, skills, and other forms of behavior. Human capital deals with the …

Take it from the political consultants: If you want more voters, don’t just stand there, move to where all the voters are. Simple….and Dead Wrong®. As far as voters go, there’s only one thing worse than being on the other side of an issue; being unreliable. See why with Free To Choose® Media Executive Editor and Cato Institute Senior Fellow Johan Norberg.

The Federal Reserve was originally created to bring stability to our financial and monetary system. However, despite multiple failures, it has widely escaped criticism. There is a myth that the Fed is there to protect us. But upon closer inspection, does it? If you ask Nobel laureate Dr. James Buchanan, the answer is clear, “The Fed more or less just inherited this legacy of being a monopoly in control of a monetary institution. It’s not a constitutional body. It has never been explicitly examined legislatively. And yet it gets away with all this without any criticism because the criticism is …

When the Soviet Union collapsed, countries in the Eastern Bloc were faced with a huge challenge. They needed to take their socialist societies and convert them into capitalist ones. How did they change a country where most property was state-owned into something that was based on private property? Each country handled it differently and the results are not surprising. Despite these challenges in the early 90’s, Milton Friedman remained optimistic, “The hopeful thing about this is that the inefficiency of the former system is so great that the new system can make great progress even though they have very inefficient …

Don’t blame socialism for Venezuela’s horrors. It’s just that the oil price collapsed, so obviously an oil dependent country couldn’t afford imports and all that spending. Dead Wrong®. Collapse is a strong word, as a matter of fact it’s not even the correct word. Find out why from Free To Choose® Media Executive Editor and Cato Institute Senior Fellow Johan Norberg.

Government regulation is a force that influences nearly every aspect of our daily lives. The intentions are usually well-meaning. They are created to fix a problem or a perceived market failure. The problem that we run into time and time again is that the fixes usually create another problem, while only putting a temporary patch over the initial problem. The response is usually another patch with the same result. In the words of Nobel laureate George Stigler, “The trouble is that normally the way (advocates) want to solve the problem is to create either a new agency, or a new …

What is money? For thousands of years currency was tied to a commodity, if the commodity itself wasn’t actually exchanged. Today, that relationship has drastically been altered. Money, as a human institution, has evolved from having a real value to only having a perceived value. Milton Friedman traces it back to one specific date. “It’s seldom that you can date precisely when there’s a major change in a human institution let alone in a monetary institution. But you know it’s an interesting fact that you can date precisely a really drastic change in the character in the monetary system around …